Holes cut into my nice shiney cockpit for the floor hatch & rudder mounting recesses.Recesses assembled and glued into place.I have since also added combing under the hatch hole to take the seal.It was a bit stressful taking the jigsaw to my nice shiney cockpit, but it had to be done.

It was my intent to have 2 PVC tubes running from the foreward wall of this hatch into the hull to store my fishing rods away when navigating the surf, but alas, when I did a trial install it was not possible to phyically get the rods into the tubes ... never mind, this area will make a nice watertight storage compartment for my fishing gear.

It feels like I have been spending the last month doing lots and achieving nothing but I am finally starting to make some visible progress again.

A good break over christmas & new year has allowed me to spend plenty of quality time with the LOML She is now getting very close to having a test run. I will likely put her in the water to see if she is seaworthy next week sometime.

All the accessories have been mounted & perfected, and now it's time to add the decks and finish her off.

Apparently ply is not dense enough (too much air) for a transducer to shoot through properly, so I cut out a mounting hole and filled it with thickened epoxy. The wooden supports and velcro are for the f/f battery box, I will likely add bungy cord to support the box during the inevitable turtle moments.

and of course I have to be able to lift her somehow. A handle each forward and aft plus two at midships will do the trick.

I don't have any scales to weigh her but I fear that some over indulging at christmas time has caused her to pack on the pounds a little; oh well ... at least she should be strong enough to drag my big butt around all day.

_________________"Life is measured in achievement, not in years alone"Bruce McLaren

Well after 5 months my precious is on the water.Not quite complete yet but usable and the finishing coats can wait until winter; we are into the prime fishing season in New Zealand now so I need to make the most of the conditions while time permits.

My girls helping me take her for a test drive

Bear in mind my experience is with a Cobra Fish 'n' Dive (and even that is quite limited) but I felt this boat was a real pleasure to paddle and would cruise/glide very easily. In my mind it tracks well and was fairly responsive when asked to turn but will still benefit from a fully functional rudder (see my lessons below).With myself and my 5yo daughter (combined load of around 165kg), the water level was around 10mm below the top of the scupper so I'm fairly happy with the load capacity, although I will need to spread the load more evenly to load up the bow more next time.

Overall I was very happy with the result but I did learn a few lessons.1. My foot pegs are not mounted securely enough ... easy to fix with a few stainless screws.2. My rudder floats (duh it is wood ) so I need to install a cam cleat to lock it down ... another easy fix.3. My hatch retaining system is not good enough. My fully sealed cockpit storage was full to the brim with water ... the water comes up through the scupper and straight under the seal, although very little water got into the main hull. I have concealed bungy cords pulling the hatch down but this doesn't get a good enough seal, looks like I will be trialling another method for the next outing ... at this stage I'm thinking half a dozen twist latches holding the hatch down is the best approach as I want to keep the deck as clear as possible.4. My inattention has led to what I think is the dreaded amine blush in a couple of areas (I assume this is what it is; it only showed up after spending some time out in the sun). This is most noticable on the rudder. This should be easily fixed when I make some finishing touches during winter.

And now for some pics of the finished product

_________________"Life is measured in achievement, not in years alone"Bruce McLaren

I don't know if you have been following my Wade Fish build thread, hard to tell, no one comments.any way, the center console is with out a doubt the best thing i added to my boat. It's such a handy area to get to.Hatch sealing can drive you nuts!! I use clear tape to seal off my forward hatch as I will never use it while paddling. it's mostly for storing my crab gear while off the water, I raised the sides of my center console so as not to take on water. and it works very well indeed. any way looks good. I also floated mine and now have been painting for about a week. almost finished.Keep up the good work!